QLD: Q&A Distribution and Accuracy of BCC Meeting Minutes

These Q&As are about the accuracy and distribution of body corporate committee meeting minutes.

Table of Contents:

• QUESTION: Our third quarter levy notice revealed a discrepancy between the AGM approved levy amounts and the calculations in the lot budget summary. The committee voted to issue updated AGM minutes to show the change. Is this reasonable?
• QUESTION: In QLD, does the body corporate’s financial statement need to be included in the minutes of an EGM?
• QUESTION: What obligation does the committee have to inform the body corporate of significant unpaid levies that have been outstanding for more than a year? Should this information be included in committee meeting minutes?
• QUESTION: Our body corporate manager provides different committee meeting agendas for committee members and owners. Why are there different versions? Are owners allowed to know what’s to be discussed at the meeting?
• QUESTION: At a committee meeting, can observers be asked to leave while the committee discussed a legal matter? Are votes valid, also should minutes be taken and decisions recorded after residents are asked to leave?
• QUESTION: As a record of the meeting minutes, can our committee use a spreadsheet that is updated at the meeting and covers all agenda items? This spreadsheet would be saved as a .pdf and uploaded to our portal as a permanent record.
• QUESTION: At a committee meeting, the caretaker made defamatory comments about some owners by name. This discussion was left out of the minutes. Should the minutes be changed to reflect the discussions?
• QUESTION: Our Body Corporate manager advised they should attend meetings as only their minutes will be accepted by the Commissioner’s Office in event of a dispute. Is this correct?
• QUESTION: How many days does the Body Corporate have to distribute meeting minutes? Is the Body Corporate required to respond to correspondence within 6 weeks?
• QUESTION: Regarding closed-door discussions at committee meetings and non-members being asked to leave the room, can a lot owner challenge this request and stay and listen to the committee’s discussion?
• QUESTION: Who can vote to confirm minutes of a previous AGM for a strata body corporate?
• QUESTION: What is the minimum requirement that our Body Corporate Manager has to put in our body corporate committee meeting minutes? At present, our minutes don’t include any correspondence, financial matters, or many other items.
• QUESTION: I’m questioning the accuracy of our meeting minutes as they do not include all the requirement by legislation. The other situation I am concerned about is the validity of voting outside of the committee meeting.
• QUESTION: I’m questioning our body corporate committee minutes of our AGM. I’ve found that although I did attend this meeting I was not included in the list of attendees of owners and committee members.
• QUESTION: What are the rules regarding closed-door discussions at committee meetings and the transparency of the body corporate committee meeting minutes in such circumstances?

Question: Our third quarter levy notice revealed a discrepancy between the AGM approved levy amounts and the calculations in the lot budget summary. The committee voted to issue updated AGM minutes to show the change. Is this reasonable?

When the body corporate levies notice for the third quarter of the financial year was issued, it became apparent there was an error involving the GST component of the calculations for quarterly payments displayed in the AGM agenda. The quarterly levy amounts approved by the body corporate at the AGM did not agree with the calculations in the lot budget summary.

The committee voted to issue updated AGM minutes with amendments to the approved quarterly amounts.

Is this a compliant solution, or should approval of the amendments to the quarterly levy amounts be decided by the body corporate at an EGM?

Answer: It sounds like you have thought through the options and arrived at a fair and manageable solution for owners.

With the caveat that we don’t have all the details, this approach sounds reasonable.

Sometimes, there are problems with a meeting notice or the minutes, and issuing amended minutes to rectify that is standard practice.

Here, it sounds like you have thought through the options and arrived at a fair and manageable solution for owners.

The key thing is to provide a clear explanation to all owners as to why the amendment is being made and its impact. Mostly, people understand if they know how and why something has happened. Accompanying the amended minutes with a letter from the committee/body corporate manager may be the best way to do it. It may also be worth holding a VOC or recording a committee minute before the amendment to confirm that the change to the minutes is a majority decision of the committee.

If there is a major financial impact, you may also need to consider providing owners with some leeway if they struggle to make any additional payments.

After that, owners have the right to complain if they are unhappy, and you may have to do a bit of work talking to disgruntled owners to smooth things over. Owners have the right to make formal complaints and even seek adjudication if unsatisfied. Maybe a court would have a different opinion to the above, but alternatives may involve jumping through some legislative hoops to arrive at the same outcome. If a clean and simple solution is available, it is usually worth taking it.

William Marquand
Tower Body Corporate
E: willmarquand@towerbodycorporate.com.au
P: 07 5609 4924

This post appears in the February 2024 edition of The QLD Strata Magazine.

Question: In QLD, does the body corporate’s financial statement need to be included in the minutes of an EGM?

Answer: The simple answer is no.

The simple answer is no. EGM’s can be for a wide range of topics, and the minutes should reflect the content of the EGM.

However, the statements should be easily available for you anytime via an online portal or by asking your manager. If you have any difficulty accessing them, that is a warning sign.

William Marquand
Tower Body Corporate
E: willmarquand@towerbodycorporate.com.au
P: 07 5609 4924

This post appears in Strata News #673.

Question: What obligation does the committee have to inform the body corporate of significant unpaid levies that have been outstanding for more than a year? Should this information be included in committee meeting minutes?

Answer: There is no need to publish levy arrears in committee meeting minutes.

Rather unusually for laws, the BCCM Act requires a body corporate to sue someone once the levies have been outstanding for two years. Lots of committees handle default delicately and don’t necessarily rub people’s noses in the fact they have not paid their levies by publishing that to all owners. A good committee is proactive about levy recovery because the amounts owing don’t go away. They just accrue and then the other owners are carrying the entire financial burden.

But at the core of it – there is no need to publish levy arrears in committee meeting minutes.

Frank Higginson
Hynes Legal
E: frank.higginson@hyneslegal.com.au
P: 07 3193 0500

This post appears in the November 2023 edition of The QLD Strata Magazine.

Question: Our body corporate manager provides different committee meeting agendas for committee members and owners. Why are there different versions? Are owners allowed to know what’s to be discussed at the meeting?

Our body corporate manager provides different committee meeting agendas for committee members and owners.

Owners are sent a ‘notification’ of the meeting, with generic agenda items that never change and don’t have any specific information, e.g. business arising, ratifying VOC’s, general business, etc.

The committee’s agenda includes dot points of the specific topics and motions to be discussed at the meeting.

Why are there different versions? Are owners allowed to know what’s to be discussed at the meeting?

Answer: It is accepted that the issues do not need to be listed as motions, but the agenda must detail the subject to be covered at the committee meeting.

The notice to call a committee meeting must include an agenda stating the substance of issues to be considered.

It is accepted that the issues do not need to be listed as motions, but the agenda must detail the subject to be covered at the committee meeting. In Coronation Gardens [2007] QBCCMCmr353 the adjudicator relevantly provided:

“Fine detail is not required, but enough information for any lot owner to see that a subject in which he or she has an interest will be discussed eg. ‘Lot 12, application for pergola…”

It has similarly been accepted that the committee is not required to submit explanatory notes to accompany the motion, except where specifically provided for in the legislation.

Alternatively, if the subject of the motion is not included on the agenda, the committee may consider issues raised at the meeting itself (ordinarily noted as ‘other general business’). In 212 on Margaret [2010] QBCCMCmr163 the adjudicator relevantly provided (our emphasis):

“…I am of the opinion that there is no legislative requirement for all motions considered at a committee meeting to be ‘nominated’ or ‘submitted’ prior to the committee meeting. Rather, it is permissible for a motion to be determined at a committee meeting without first being ‘nominated’ or ‘submitted’ to the committee meeting agenda.”

There is an exception to this position, pursuant to section 57(3) of the Body Corporate and Community Management (Standard Module) Regulation 2020 (Qld), which provides that the agenda must include the substance of the following motions:

1. if there has been a previous meeting of the committee- a motion to confirm the minutes of the preceding meeting; and
2. if the committee has passed, a resolution other than at a meeting of the committee—a motion to confirm the resolution.

Accordingly, unless the motion considers the above exceptions, there is no legislative requirement to list the precise terms of the motion in the agenda. There need only be sufficient detail to identify the substance of the issue to be considered.

Holly Dunne
Mahoneys
E: tgarsden@mahoneys.com.au
P: 07 3007 3753

This post appears in the October 2023 edition of The QLD Strata Magazine.

Question: At a committee meeting, can observers be asked to leave while the committee discussed a legal matter? Are votes valid, also should minutes be taken and decisions recorded after residents are asked to leave?

I attended a formal committee meeting recently as an observer. The meeting covered a number of minor agenda items, then the Chair told those present that the committee was going to discuss a legal matter and that all observers need to leave. A number of important agenda items were not covered.

What is the standing of any agenda items voted on after residents were asked to leave?

Can these votes be added to the minutes even though no residents were allowed to be at the meeting?

Answer: The decisions that were made by the committee are valid irrespective of whether they had observers present.

The decisions that were made by the committee are valid irrespective of whether they had observers present.

Relevantly, section 63(6) of the Standard Module sets out all the circumstances in which an observer must not be present for the discussion of certain issues if the committee determines so. This includes the following issues:

1. By-law breaches
2. Commencing a proceeding;
3. Proceedings against the body corporate; or
4. Disputes with the body corporate and an owner, occupier, caretaker or body corporate manager.

It sounds as though the committee followed the specified process in relation to these agenda items.

Todd Garsden
Mahoneys
E: tgarsden@mahoneys.com.au
P: 07 3007 3753

This post appears in Strata News #589.

Question: As a record of the meeting minutes, can our committee use a spreadsheet that is updated at the meeting and covers all agenda items? This spreadsheet would be saved as a .pdf and uploaded to our portal as a permanent record.

Answer: This sounds like it might be a really good idea!

I don’t see why not and in fact, it sounds like it might be a really good idea. A spreadsheet would enable readers to search via issue, date, name and so on, which would make it arguably a more useful document.

From a legislative perspective, there’s no provision for the ‘format’ of minutes. Section 71 of the Standard Module (equivalent provisions elsewhere) provide for what actually needs to be in the minutes of a committee meeting (the substance of the minutes is more important than how they are presented) and so long as you comply with that, your spreadsheet idea should be fine too.

Chris Irons
Strata Solve
E: chris@stratasolve.com.au
P: 0419 805 898

This post appears in the May 2022 edition of The QLD Strata Magazine.

Question: At a committee meeting, the caretaker made defamatory comments about some owners by name. This discussion was left out of the minutes. Should the minutes be changed to reflect the discussions?

My wife and I attended a committee meeting as observers. At the meeting, during the delivery of the Caretakers report, the caretakers made defamatory comments specific about named owners, and another comment regarding a group of owners being drunk and disorderly.

This was not recorded in the minutes and when I challenged the Chair and secretary about this, they advised that the minutes are only required to reflect motions, votes and decisions. They refused to change the minutes.

Should the minutes be changed to reflect the discussions?

Answer: The legislation does not require them to be recorded.

Minutes should record decision – not commentary – which we first wrote about here: The meaning of ‘full and accurate minutes’ – the devil is in the detail.

After that, (and this is caveated by the statement that I would need the facts to be able to advise properly), I would not have thought that someone’s statement about another person should be minuted, and even more so if it is defamatory. It is still defamatory whether minuted or not, so the person allegedly defamed still has rights to do what they are entitled to regardless of whether it was recorded in the minutes.

So if I was advising the body corporate I would be likely telling them to steer well clear of getting involved by recording in writing what is essentially a dispute between people about statements made about the other, especially when the legislation does not require them to be recorded.

Frank Higginson
Hynes Legal
E: frank.higginson@hyneslegal.com.au
P: 07 3193 0500

This post appears in Strata News #560.

Question: Our Body Corporate manager advised they should attend meetings as only their minutes will be accepted by the Commissioner’s Office in event of a dispute. Is this correct?

Our Queensland property is a Building Format Plan and we come under the Accommodation Module. Our Body Corporate Managers have advised that they should attend our Body Corporate meetings and prepare the Minutes. Of course, this would be at a cost.

They have advised us that the Commissioner’s Office will not accept Minutes that are not prepared by a Strata Management Company in the event of a dispute. This information implies that any Minutes our BC Secretary prepares are not valid. Is this correct?

Answer: The body corporate manager’s comments are accurate, but strictly speaking it is not a requirement.

Practically, the body corporate manager’s comments are accurate, but strictly speaking it is not a requirement. A body corporate can choose to be self-managed (but it rarely works out well).

The reality is that it is almost impossible without the aid of software and templates to properly hold and minute a formal body corporate meeting. This is the benefit a body corporate manager can add.

That being said, the Commissioner’s Office does not need to review or approve minutes, but if a meeting is ever challenged, the minutes will be scrutinised.

Todd Garsden
Mahoneys
E: tgarsden@mahoneys.com.au
P: 07 3007 3753

This post appears in the September 2021 edition of The QLD Strata Magazine.

Question: How many days does the Body Corporate have to distribute meeting minutes? Is the Body Corporate required to respond to correspondence within 6 weeks?

How many days does the Body Corporate have to distribute meeting minutes? Is it 14 days?

Is the Body Corporate required to respond to correspondence within 6 weeks? If this is the case and this is not happening, how do we enforce this?

Answer: In Queensland, Committee meeting minutes have to be distributed after 21 days. There is no set time for correspondence.

In Queensland, Committee meeting minutes have to be distributed after 21 days: Running a committee meeting

There is no set time for correspondence but if an owner submits a correct motion to the Committee for consideration this must be responded to within six weeks: Submitting motions

William Marquand
Tower Body Corporate
E: willmarquand@towerbodycorporate.com.au
P: 07 5609 4924

This post appears in Strata News #507.

Question: Regarding closed-door discussions at committee meetings and non-members being asked to leave the room, can a lot owner challenge this request and stay and listen to the committee’s discussion?

Regarding closed-door discussions at committee meetings and non-members being asked to leave the room, can an owner challenge this request and stay and listen to the committee’s discussion particularly if that owner had put the request to the committee to have a by-law amended? Also, can the owner request permission to comments on some of this discussion?

Answer: There is a process for the owner to go through, including giving notice.

You may be referring to a situation where a non-committee member (i.e. an owner) has requested attendance at a committee meeting. There is a process for the owner to go through, including giving notice.

Section 63 Attendance at committee meetings — non-members of the Standard Module provides for how a non-committee member attends and participates in the meeting. Participation is quite limited. You are there as an observer only and can only speak if invited to do so by the committee.

There are also several items of business for which you must not be present, including any item of business about a by-law breach. The legislation is quite clear on these points. You might like to review these sections yourself to see if your scenarios qualify, although my reading of them is that you probably don’t have any options to ‘challenge’ or ‘comment’ on discussions.

Chris Irons
Hynes Legal
E: chris.irons@hyneslegal.com.au
P: 07 3193 0500

This post appears in Strata News #481

Question: Who can vote to confirm minutes of a previous AGM for a strata body corporate?

Who can vote to confirm minutes of a previous AGM for a strata body corporate? No eligible voters were present at our 2020 AGM and at our 2021 AGM there was a motion to pass the minutes.

I do not believe that anyone can vote on this as no-one was present, but I have received the minutes of the 2021 AGM and this motion has been passed.

Answer: The confirmation of minutes motion can be voted on by any person who is able to validly vote at the meeting.

The confirmation of minutes motion, as with all motions on an agenda, can be voted on by any person who is able to validly vote at the meeting.

The motion asks whether the minutes were a true and correct record of the previous meeting. It is not a prerequisite to have been at the previous meeting to vote on the motion.

Yes, it is easier to say with certainty that the minutes are valid if you were present at the meeting. However, you can still be reasonably confident that they were a true record provided you have some faith in the secretary/body corporate manager who attended the meeting and whose job it is to record the minutes. In turn, the minutes would have been reviewed by committee members and other owners who could have objected at the time had they been wrong. If there were issues, an amended set of minutes may have been provided. You can also verify factors on the minutes such as whether levies have been raised in accordance with the motion, whether there was an audit or contracts signed on the basis of the minutes and so on. If those items were wrong at the time the minutes were issued there would likely have been ongoing issues stemming from this indicating a problem. If those warning signs aren’t there, then it should be reasonably possible to confirm the minutes without having been present at the meeting.

Some alternatives to this would be for the Committee to go back and check with someone who was present at the meeting and record in the minutes that that process had taken place or the owners could agree to pass the minutes with a note that no one voting on the motion was present at the previous meeting. If there is a problem with one item on the minutes a correction could be included or could be addressed via a motion on the new agenda.

The other consideration here might be what will happen in the event that the minutes are not confirmed. It might depend on how serious the issue was for rejecting the minutes, but most of the time this is considered a procedural motion that should be passed. Otherwise it is difficult to wind back the clock on actions that may have already taken place.

William Marquand
Tower Body Corporate
E: willmarquand@towerbodycorporate.com.au
P: 07 5609 4924

This post appears in Strata News #474.

Question: What is the minimum requirement that our Body Corporate Manager has to put in our body corporate committee meeting minutes? At present, our minutes don’t include any correspondence, financial matters, or many other items.

What is the minimum requirement that our Body Corporate Manager has to put in our body corporate committee meeting minutes? At present, our minutes don’t include any correspondence, financial matters, or many other items. The results of decisions made are so brief that we don’t have any idea of the points put forward or against. We have around 50 lots and our minutes are two and a half pages long. We believe that the body corporate members are kept in the dark as to what the committee is doing.

Answer: Adjudicators have said there is no need to put forward general discussion of items.

Section 55 of the accommodation module sets out the requirements of meetings and provides that:

“The committee must ensure full and accurate minutes of its meetings are taken.”

The section then goes on to set out what that means.

Adjudicators have said there is no need to put forward general discussion of items. If owners do want to hear what that is then they have attendance rights at those meetings to be observers.

In The Cannery [2008] QBCCMCmr 17, the adjudicator relevantly provided that:

“A minute must record a decision made by the Committee. General discussion and who said what need not be recorded at all. The minutes are not a transcript of what was said. The committee is free to discuss what it likes. However, where discussion is recorded it should be recorded fairly and accurately, which would suffice the requirement that the body corporate acts reasonably.”

In Pelican Heights [2011] QBCCMCmr 167 the adjudicator relevantly provided that:

“Accuracy relates to the truth of what happened in the meeting or vote, rather than the truth of opinions or facts considered in the vote. The record is entitled to report what actually happened or views actually held regardless of the validity of what was done or considered.”

In relation to correspondence – it only needs to be recorded if it is tabled. In Parkwood Villas [2010] QBCCMCmr 521 the adjudicator relevantly provided that (our emphasis):

“Correspondence or other documents should be tabled at a committee meeting (and then minuted) if a committee member (perhaps most commonly the secretary who would handle most correspondence) chooses to table it. In particular, documents would be tabled if they are the subject of discussion at the meeting. It is arguable that the mere discussion of a document amounts to its tabling such that it should be minuted if it is discussed at the meeting”.

Frank Higginson
Hynes Legal
E: frank.higginson@hyneslegal.com.au
P: 07 3193 0500

This post appears in Strata News #255.

Question: I’m questioning the accuracy of our meeting minutes as they do not include all the requirement by legislation. The other situation I am concerned about is the validity of voting outside of the committee meeting.

I am not sure whether the committee meeting or voting outside of the committee meeting are valid.

There a number of committee meeting minutes, but meetings haven’t been called and sent owners advice including the agenda.

There are also minutes that confirm the previous meeting. I’m questioning the accuracy of body corporate committee meeting minutes as they do not include all the requirement by legislation. Are the motions committee voted on valid?

The other situation I am concerned about is the validity of voting outside of the committee meeting. There are records, but notices of motions haven’t been sent to owners at the same time like to committee members. Records do not state when notices with motion have been sent to committee member and their name. Is the result of the voting on the motion valid?

Answer: I think people are much better served raising the substance of the issues voted on as opposed to attacking the manner in which it the votes were cast.

Where these arguments all ultimately get to is that technical deficiencies (if there are in fact any of those) are not worth challenging. That is because if the committee still consists of the same people, they will then just formally vote the way they did before and at the same time address whatever the technical deficiency was.

Votes outside the committee are still formal committee decisions, as much as we wrote about their overuse in 2010 (!!! yes that far ago) in this article: Claytons committee meetings.

I think people are much better served raising the substance of the issues voted on as opposed to attacking the manner in which it the votes were cast. The former is far more likely to be able to get an outcome than the latter.

Frank Higginson
Hynes Legal
E: frank.higginson@hyneslegal.com.au
P: 07 3193 0500

This post appears in Strata News #219.

Question: I’m questioning our body corporate committee minutes of our AGM. I’ve found that although I did attend this meeting I was not included in the list of attendees of owners and committee members.

Last week I received the minutes of our Annual General Meeting and found that although I did attend this meeting I was not included in the list of attendees of owners and committee members.

Does that mean the meeting would be null and void in view of the incorrect numbers of votes recorded against each motion?

After objecting to the fact I was not named as being present in the AGM minutes and not receiving a satisfactory reply, I asked for a copy of the Attendance Register.

From this, I confirmed I had signed into the meeting with a signature against my lot number but I did not notice another column marked ‘Present’ where you were apparently required to print ‘yes’ if you were in attendance. (This is the first time this type of form has been produced).

I attended with a neighbour, she signed in as I had but she had seen the extra column and did print ‘yes’.

All other attendees only printed ‘yes’ as being present but provided no signatures. Anyone could put yes against any name and there would be no confirmation of same unless each individual wrote ‘yes’ in the presence of an authorised person. As it turned out, from sighting this attendance register, there was one person marked as present, who was not present.

When I received the email with the Attendance Register attached I was told I could lodge ‘an owner’s request to have the minutes adjusted to reflect your attendance’. Initially, I had been told – as I hadn’t printed ‘Yes’ in the present column I could not be counted.

I intend to point out to the Body Corporate Company that writing ‘Yes’ in the Present column does not make sense and I feel a signature at least is needed. I will also query the fact a person was counted who was not present.

As a result, if my name is adjusted on the Minutes as being present and also an adjustment/deletion is made of the person who was not present, does this mean the vote count would be correct?

With regard to the AGM minutes – would you please advise if they are to be on the Body Corporate letterhead or with a covering letter, on letterhead, to be professionally presented?

I also note the Minutes were not signed – is this permissible?

Answer: The minutes simply need to be a correct record of who was there and what went on.

I think the answers to all of these questions are that the minutes simply need to be a correct record of who was there and what went on. They don’t need to be signed or on anyone’s letterhead.

In terms of the actual voting, the owner should see whether they were recorded as voting on motions, even if they were not recorded as being in attendance and present. Owners can vote by voting paper and not be in attendance so if the voting paper was in, the owner’s vote would still have been cast and counted. Other than that, the minutes should simply be corrected. Mistakes happen.

Frank Higginson
Hynes Legal
E: frank.higginson@hyneslegal.com.au
P: 07 3193 0500

This post appears in Strata News #194.

Question: What are the rules regarding closed-door discussions at committee meetings and the transparency of the body corporate committee meeting minutes in such circumstances?

Recently I attended my body corporate committee meeting. I’m not a committee member but have ensured I’ve attended the last 3 meetings (excluding the AGM). At a particular point in the last meeting, lot owners attending who weren’t committee members were asked to leave the room so the committee could discuss a by-law which I and several other lot owners are seeking to have amended or repealed.

When the body corporate committee meeting minutes were distributed to owners there was nothing mentioned in the minutes regarding the closed-door discussion or the fact that non-committee member lot owners had been asked to leave the room whilst the discussion occurred.

What are the rules regarding closed-door discussions at committee meetings and the transparency of the body corporate committee meeting minutes in such circumstances? I wrote to both our body corporate and strata manager advising I believed the minutes were erroneous and/or incomplete.

Answer: At a minimum, there should be a record that discussion about the issue occurred.

At a minimum, there should be a record that discussion about the issue occurred. Subject to what the issue of concern it is may be appropriate to leave the decision out of the minutes, but I think the chances of that are remote.

What the committee discusses, and decides, should be a matter of community record – even if the subject is controversial. Ultimately, proper decisions on matters of substance are reserved for owners in general meeting anyway.

Frank Higginson
Hynes Legal
E: frank.higginson@hyneslegal.com.au
P: 07 3193 0500

This post appears in Strata News #113.

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